Simon Maddock

Rachel and Evelyn posing for a picture together

Thrilled that Rachel Gray had a successful viva today! 🐢🐢🧬🧬
My first PhD student #ProudPI
Major thanks to @simonmaddock.bsky.social and Axel Barlow for being examiners
@sciencesncl.bsky.social

Two caecilians in the shape of a double helix.

I'm not procrastinating.... making #Pride caecilian DNA stickers is a requirement of my dissertation. Schistometopum thomense and S. ephele, the iconic duo of my PhD work.

Night time camera trap image of a honey badger

Photo of cute giraffe on a dirt road in the scrub forest

Photo of a group of students crowded around a rock wall looking at ancient rock art

Students on a field in sunny South Africa surveying tick populations

Returning from another amazing field course hosted at Leshiba Wilderness in South Africa. Wonderful students, great colleagues @simonmaddock.bsky.social and Marion! Highlight was the honey badger on the camera trap! @sciencesncl.bsky.social

Yes, both strategies can be seen within the same population

Great that you have highlighted the Seychelles treefrog! In response to your egg laying question (I note I am not from Seychelles but ...): I have found eggs both out of the water and in the water. In the water I have found them on vegetation and stuck to rocks. A SUPER COOL SPECIES!

Leverhulme Scholars Leverhulme Scholars

DICE is advertising an additional four PhD studentships through our Leverhulme ‘Space for Nature’ Doctoral Scholars programme.

All have a deadline of Deadline 23/04/25.

www.kent.ac.uk/durrell-inst...

England’s non-woodland trees mapped and available freely for the first time - Forest Research

Online map of non-woodland trees in England published by @forestresearchuk.bsky.social

(A) Island connectivity with sea level change. Present-day emergent land is coloured for cluster membership inferred with DAPC (see B), and islands unsampled in this study are shown in white. Sampling localities are shown by green dots. Elevation (above sea level) is shown by contour lines (200 m spacing). Smaller islands (Ste. Anne and Curieuse) are circled for clarity. The grey shaded area represents exposed land, with the shade of grey in the key indicating metres below current sea level. Bathymetry data from the GEBCO 2024 repository. Inset map shows position of the Seychelles (indicated with a green loop) relative to Africa. Latitude and longitude given in decimal degrees. (B) DAPC of K = 4, with eight PCs and two eigenvalues. (C) Hypogeophis rostratus, photographed by STM.

Structure plot with 10 runs permuted in CLUMPAK and plotted in distruct for K = 2 and K = 3. Vertical bars represent individuals (n = 77). Labels above the plots correspond to the major genetic clusters. Colour codes as in (1B).

New paper led by Miranda Sherlock on "Submerged Corridors of Ancient Gene Flow in an Island Amphibian". In this paper we found that populations of the Seychelles #caecilian Hypogeophis rostratus would have been connected by palaeo-islands across Seychelles
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....
🧪🐸🐍

Cover of the journal "Nature" showing a long-nosed horned frog on leaf litter and the words "Heat Stress: How vulnerable are the worlds amphibians to rising temperatures?"

We made the cover

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Lecturer in Physical Geography :Oxford Road

JOB ALERT Exciting opportunity for a Lecturer (equivalent to Assistant Professor) in #PhysicalGeography specialising in #peatland science to join our #Geography department at @uniofmanchester.bsky.social.

Full details for the job can be found here: www.jobs.manchester.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

They missed a trick with that!

Adder game

And how good is this educational game about the yearly natural history of the adder. This has been a huge success in educating school kids.

Andy Lees

Samuel Betts

Lucy Struthers

Adder beer label

An awesome evening for the launch of the new Adder Pilsner label from Allendale Brewery. Beer and adder talks (the work going on in the North Pennines). What is not to like?!

Lucy and Samuel did a fantastic job presenting the work we have been doing on Conservation Genomics of adders in the region.

Comparing the Fate of eDNA by Particle Sizes and Molecule Lengths in Recirculating Streams The detection of environmental DNA (eDNA) has revolutionized aquatic species monitoring, yet interpreting eDNA data remains challenging due to gaps in our understanding of eDNA ecology (i.e., origin,...

New paper alert! 🚨- My final PhD chapter is finally out!

What happens to different eDNA components in water? 🌊💧

We tested particle size (small vs. large) and DNA molecule length (86 vs. 387 bp) in recirculating streams—and what we found might surprise you! 🧵👇

#eDNA #MolecularEcology
🔗 Read more:

Looking for a PhD in birds and woodlands? We have a funded project available to those eligible to apply as a domestic student (in Australia) @uq-cbcs.bsky.social - message me if interested!

YouTube video by wateratleeds UK Freshwater Quality Programme Webinar, January 2025: A project update from ECOMIX.

If you missed the webinar on progress on the NERC ECOMIX project then you can now view it online. In the presentation, the team provide an update on the monitoring, modelling and ecotoxicology work being done on Yorkshire's rivers.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSXB...

Seychelles tree frog (Tachycnemis seychellensis)

And who can forget the amazing Seychelles tree #frog (Tachycnemis seychellensis). This is a female, and in this particular population the males are brown.

We also found two species of caecilian but I failed to get any pictures.

🧪🐍🐸🔬

Thomasset's Seychelles frog or Thomasset's frog (Sooglossus thomasseti)

Workshop team discussing amphibians in the field.

Thomasset's Seychelles frog (Sooglossus thomasseti) is the largest of the endemic Seychelles frog family Sooglossidae, and perhaps the rarest of them (or least frequently encountered at least). 🧪🐍🐸🔬

Gardiner's Seychelles frog (Sechellophryne gardineri)

Gardiner's Seychelles frog (Sechellophryne gardineri)

The IUCN Red List and Green Status workshops are going fantastically. Tonight we had a break from the computer and found several of the #amphibians that we have been assessing. Here is a beautiful Gardiner's Seychelles #frog (Sechellophryne gardineri), one of the smallest frogs in the World.

🧪🐍🐸🔬

Frog workshop

The first day of the joint IUCN Red List and Green Status of Species workshop (the first time they have ever run concurrently) was a great success, focussing on the #frogs of the Seychelles. On to the #caecilians tomorrow

Louise Hobin

Magdalena Cygan

We also had talks from the IUCN Red List (Louise Hobin) and Green Status of Species (Magdalena Cygan) authorities about their work. This is a precursor to the Red List and Green Status assessments coming up over the next four days.

Ellen Sharkey

Ellen Sharkey being interviewed for SBC

Ellen did a fantastic talk about her PhD topic looking at climate change in #caecilians.

The Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation were here, who will be doing a segment about the symposium, and Ellen and I gave an interview about the importance of getting people together for these events.

Delegates of the SEYCHELLES ENDEMIC AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES: CURRENT KNOWLEDGE AND NEXT STEPS FOR CONSERVATION

Jessica Constance

Markus Roesch

Today's "SEYCHELLES ENDEMIC AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES: CURRENT KNOWLEDGE AND NEXT STEPS FOR CONSERVATION" symposium was a great success, with many fascinating talks. There have been lots of updates since the last time we ran a Seychelles amphibian symposium in 2019.

We did record it and we will see how we can make it available. Watch this space

It was a great pleasure to present Seychelles reptile diversity and my research on the endemic bronze geckos today at the "Seychelles Endemic #Amphibian & #Reptile Symposium". 🦎🐍

@jimlabisko.bsky.social @simonmaddock.bsky.social

Happening now! Don't miss it!

Ellen Sharkey with Hypogeophis alternans

Three amphibian biologists under a rock

Proud supervisor alert 🚨

@ellensharkey.bsky.social is looking at the impacts of climate change on Seychelles caecilians for her PhD. Today she encountered her first ever #caecilian and it was a beauty ... a large female Stejneger's Caecilian (Hypogeophis alternans)

@seychellesherps.bsky.social 🧪🐸

Possible migrations routes and survival estimates for eastern and western populations of Yellow-breasted Bunting.

Yellow-breasted Bunting with coloured leg rings and tracking device (geolocator) on its back

Finally published: migration routes and adult survival of the critically endangered Yellow-breasted Bunting

doi.org/10.1038/s415...

-moderate survival in E but no returning birds in W
-long autumn (moult) stopovers in China

Many thanks to all collaborators in 🇷🇺🇩🇪🇲🇳🇹🇭🇲🇲

#animalmigration #ornithology

Leap into amphibian genomics 🐸 with this new year read.

The Amphibian Genomics Consortium (AGC) is advancing global efforts to sequence high-quality genomes and bridge the gap in amphibian research.

Text: Society for the Study of Evolution Undergraduate Diversity at Evolution Program. Applications due January 20, 2025. Background is a blue and orange abstract painting.

Are you or do you know an undergrad interested in evolution? The SSE Undergraduate Diversity at Evolution program provides funding, mentoring, and a presentation opportunity at #Evol2025. Applications due Monday! https://buff.ly/4eExoFL